In recent years, interest in physical fitness has dramatically increased, spawning interest in exercising and equipment aiding exercise. Although equipment to aid indoor physical exercise is available in gymnasiums, it is particularly convenient to have exercise apparatus available in the home. Typically, exercise equipment employs elements which are gripped or engaged by some part of the body and which offer resistance to the user's efforts to move them. Ideally, the amount of resistance may be varied to accomodate the strength and weight of the user. Fixed rods or bars are also of use in aiding exercises such as chin-ups, pull-ups and sit-ups. Large, expensive gymnasium-type exercise equipment is not well suited for home use by the average person. Compact, inexpensive and lightweight exercise apparatus is desirable for home use, yet the equipment must be both sturdy and versatile to justify its purchase. It is desirable that home exercise apparatus not employ weights lifted through a cable and pulley arrangement in order that excessive equipment weight may be avoided. Existing exercise equipment employing weights, cables and pulleys is either too light for effective exercise and muscle development and toning or too heavy for reasonable home installation and use.
A multi-purpose exercise device is described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,072,309 to Wilson. That device has a handled, angled lever arm. Opposite the handled end, a first pin passes through and is welded to the lever arm. Rigid fingers are welded to each end of the pin. The arm is pivotally attached to a vertical column by passing a second pin through the opposite end of both fingers and through one of a plurality of holes in a rail welded to the column. The arm may be held in a fixed position by yet another set of fingers which slip over the first pin and are then likewise pinned to rail on the column. Alternatively, elastic bands are slipped around the first pin and additional pins inserted in one of the holes in the rail to allow the arm to be pivoted against resistance. Regardless of how the Wilson device is set up, stress exerted by the user is concentrated undesirably on the welds between the lever arm and first pin. Stress exerted on the second pin tending to tear the rail from the column is not released or distributed to any other element of the device. Moreover, the lever arm is unstable with respect to moments lying in a vertical plane. An earlier patent, U.S. Pat. No. 3,989,241 to Ourgant, discloses exercising apparatus having a column and two sleeves slidable along it, one sleeve carrying a pivotally mounted lever arm and the other carrying a hanger bar with biasing means connected between the arm and bar.